Pre-Finishing

Preparations for the glue-up for a piece of mahogany and maple. On the recommendation of a coworker, I taped off the areas that were to be glued and put on an initial coat of finish. The finish is oil-based, so the theory is that by having a coat of finish the water-based wood glue wouldn't seep into the wood once the two are joined. This worked out well. After the finished dried and the two pieces were glued, I used a wet rag to remove the glue to was squeezed out. It did not appear to seep into the wood. The joined pieces of wood make a beautiful complement to one an other and this should turn out to be a nice frame when finished.

Maggie in Maple

A whole uninterrupted day of work, and I did get a fair amount finished. Started a mahogany and maple frame. It's much like my oak and aspen frame, but I've routed a few more edges. Also building a poplar frame I plan to paint. I couldn't find wood dye/stain in the color I wanted, so I decided just to paint a frame. I've been told poplar is good for painting so I thought I'd give it a try.
After re-gluing the first maple frame I cut the glass, put this print into it, and closed it all up. This picture of Maggie I took a couple of years ago, and the light colors in the picture work well with the light color of the maple.

New Years Vinny

Attempted to finish off two frames today. The prints had arrived, but I found I had cut the 1/2" slot in the back of the maple frames far too short. I had planned on widening these up with my router, but that didn't go as planned. When I started the cut the router grabbed the frame and threw it, breaking all four sides at the glue joints. No use being upset over it. I widened the grove and re-glued the frame. Turns out that little accident bent the router bit too, so I'll need a new one. So rather than try that again, I took the second maple frame and simply trimmer down the print.
Pictured is the second maple frame with Vinny on New Years. The stain sucks and didn't work at all, but the frame is assembled to my liking.

Aspen and Oak

Aspen and Oak Frame

New frame design idea I'm trying out. This frame uses two woods (in this case, aspen and oak). Since I'm fairly bad at cutting matting, I thought I'd try letting the frame mat the picture using two colors of wood. Oak I've worked with and I have applied a red stain to it. Aspen I've not worked with before, but it looked nice and light so I thought I'd give it a try. I masked off the edge of the oak I wanted to glue and then stained it. While it was drying, I routed the aspen. There is only one router cut needed for this frame, the 1/2" I use for overlap. I then glued the two pieces together (using every clamp I had) and let them dry overnight. Doing the miter cuts was a little more challenging as the wood just didn't want to sit flat on the saw, but after one correction I had all my 45s cut. Then glue and into the frame clamp.

Mahogany Frame

Prints arrived today from a new company I was trying out. The previous company I ordered prints through didn't have many large sizes available, but this other company did. What I liked about this place is they had options for how much border I wanted on the print, and when the prints arrived, they had the correct borders. The last company had borders, but they were not even or even close to what I had specified.
Pictured is the completed mahogany frame. I really like mahogany wood. This is just an oil finish, and it brings out a nice warm grain pattern. Because I had broken two sheets of glass for this frame already, I decided to try plexiglass. I cut it with a circular saw, which made a honorably edge. That didn't matter because there is a 1/2" of frame overlap so the messy edge isn't visible. It costs a little more, but is significantly lighter and I seem to have better luck cutting it to size. The photograph doesn't do justice to just how nice the wood turned out.

This is my make-shift paint booth for spraying lacquer. The chemicals in lacquer make for a vial smell. One of the guys I work with loves a lacquer finish and was telling me about the paint booth he constructed. I thought I'd see how tolerable the smell was with a ventilated booth and constructed this.
The booth is made of mil 3 plastic stapled to the ceiling. A few scrap 2x4" board hold down the edges, and one of my centrifugal fans vents exhaust out a window. For spraying in the booth I have a respirator so I don't smell anything. Out of the booth I noticed the smell of lacquer for about 5 minutes, but it was quite weak. After that, I didn't smell it at all. So, the booth worked.